David Beckham

[wellsy]

The fans were the most hilarious part, the cheering of every single Beckham touch. Then to see him get a knock on the ankle again and then the look on the fans faces, priceless.

[Guest Texasmag]

Anyone watching the friendly? Not actually a bad game, but ESPN has no idea how to broadcast this sport.

 

American commentators are the pits! They don't have a clue!

[Guest Knightrider]

To be honest though when I see kids playing these days in the park they're far more focused on technique and skill than they ever used to be, trying tricks all the time and getting egged on by their mates to 'do the elastico' or whatever. When I was younger it was a case of charging everyone down and fighting it out and I'm only 23, so I think the culture is changing here. I put it down to the foreign influence on the Premiership more than anything else, people idolise the likes of Thierry Henry and Cristiano Ronaldo these days rather than people like Ian Wright or Gary Lineker.

 

Agreed 100% which is great, however more and more park space is being bought by housing developers and given today's dangers, more and more parents are unwilling to just let their kids play outside, all meaning playing street football that hones skill and technique, is slowly but surely being taking away from kids and replaced with organised junior football which if my own experiences of North Eastern junior football are anything to go by is shocking - vicious in many ways as kids are shouted at to tackle, to work hard and to get it forward quickly to the big centre-forward with a hard shot. In short what kids learn in the park and out on the street, is being knocked out of them when they get to junior football. Those good enough to get into academies, it is even worse where the emphasis is on speed, strength and athleticism.

 

According to one Man Utd academy coach, skills and technique can be coached and learned later on. They are teaching kids as young as 6 about the basics of the game when in reality all they need to do is get a ball at their feet and play with it, to have fun, not know the difference between a a centre-back and a right-back.

 

I don't think English football is suffering, the youth coaching isn't aimed at dribbling skill but then English players generally haven't had the quick feet and agility of the Brazilians. It's natural for coaches to work on the strengths of a youngster, and if that's a deft touch and an eye for a pass they'll work on that rather than trying to get them to skin people all day.

 

I disagree on all points, we will never have the flair of the Brazilians but why can't we have the technique of the Dutch, a small footballing nation - a fellow European nation? All kids want to do with a ball is run with it, dribble, do tricks and to skin their opponent, yet they aren't being encouraged to do this or rather coaches and junior teams don't see this as part of OUR game, like you said, and concentrate on our strengths. It is a culture thing as we are famous for our spirit, work rate, strength and honesty but for my money, these things don't need to be coached, they are already in us, just like the falir is in Brazilians. We need to remove that mindset and concentrate solely on skill, technique and flair.

 

We're not an unsuccessful footballing nation, we're one of the only 7 countries ever to have lifted the world cup and everybody, English or otherwise, nearly always predicts us to make the last 8. We haven't made that extra step to the final too often because of a combination of luck, penalties, poor tactics or simply being beaten by a better team. Truth is we are a very good footballing nation who regularly make the last 8 in the world cup but there are better nations out there. This idea that we're rubbish because we can't get to the final is silly, we were knocked out of the quarters by a famous handball in 86 against an Argentina team with arguably the greatest player who ever lived, four years later we missed a place in the final on penalties. In 98 we lost on penalties to Argentina, in 2002 we lost 2-1 to the eventual winners Brazil and last year we were knocked out on penalties. We're one of the top ten sides in the world but there's better out there.

 

I agree, but we are an underperforming nation in terms of football.

 

If we're getting anything wrong it's the tactics/performances on the big occasion against those teams better than us.

 

At the top level, yes, without a doubt, we lag way behind despite having the talent and from what I've seen it isn't the talent that lets us down it is tactics and such. What I will say though is that our players are tactically less aware than our counterparts and far less imaginative, which is down to schooling, this hinders us too as it doesn't allow us to adapt or to ever be 100% comfortable in a game, especially on the ball.

 

To cut a long story short I think there's way too much finger pointing goes on with regard to the England team. Football reflects culture, the Italians will always be organised and solid defensively, the Brazilians will always have their samba football and the English will always be a team of passion and width. The culture of our football is changing slightly but trying to get English kids playing samba football would be a disaster to be honest.

 

I agree in the main, we do overreact, but at lower level, kids football, honestly, it's a shocking state of affairs and that's what drives the top end of our game, or feeds it so while our Premiership is first-class and our national team brimming with top stars, will that always be the case? Not if we don't rethink how we do junior football and change our ideas about our own game. IMO.

[Guest paddy]

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/44013000/jpg/_44013682_beckham_simpsons417.jpg

 

new galaxy coaching set up   

[olliemort]

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/44013000/jpg/_44013682_beckham_simpsons417.jpg

 

new galaxy coaching set up   

wos that really on the sideline?the simpsons not beckham!

[Guest paddy]

yeah promo for some film thats coming out

 

[CaliMag]

Got back from the game late last night - I'lll try to post some photos tomorrow.

Couple of observations - The Galaxy are even more woeful than last year - they barely seemed to know eachother. Landon Donovan hasn;t been good since the 2002 world cup. Cobi Jones is as slow as Steven Carr... adn on that note - WTF happened to Shevchenko? He used to be a good player and now he is horrible. Made the Galaxy defence look classy and composed. Watching him turn was like watching the Queen Mary coming to port.

We can all laugh at the fact that the loudest cheers were when Beckham was warming up, took the field, touched the ball etc.... but really as Newcastle fans we don't have any credibility on this subject... Imagine Shearer coming back from a 3 month injury say circa 2002.

 

Overall a decent night out.

[Mike]

I thought the book on Sheva was that he didn't have Kaka behind him anymore.

 

I didn't think the game was bad, although I have no frame of reference for Galaxy games. Chelsea were as boring as ever, of course. Still, ESPN and those god damn picture in picture interviews, splitscreen "Beckham cam" shots where he's playing with his ankle, constantly cutting to the stands to show the celebrities drinking champagne and looking for the ball...It was unbearable.

[ohmelads]

Sounds like they gave him a 12 minute cameo to get the fanfare out the way. Lalas has already spoken about the disrupting affect it's all had.

[CaliMag]

Sounds like they gave him a 12 minute cameo to get the fanfare out the way. Lalas has already spoken about the disrupting affect it's all had.

Absolutely but Lalas has to take some of the blame here. He has worked tirelessly to make the Galaxy what it is today and that seems to be a "franchise" rather than a football club. Two years ago when he took over the Galaxy had just won the league and what Lalas and Yallop have done has resulted in LA dropping like a rock. There has been a focus on personality over actual substance and that will just not work for very long. My prediction is that both of them will be replaced at the end of the season because they won;t make it to the playoffs and the money men behind teh Backham move will force them to bring in real managment. My prediction: Klinnsman as either manager or CEO.

[OzzieMandias]

They could do worse than Klinsi.

[Mick]

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/44013000/jpg/_44013682_beckham_simpsons417.jpg

 

new galaxy coaching set up   

 

My mistake, I thought it was our coaching set up.

[sparta]

I don't think English football is suffering, the youth coaching isn't aimed at dribbling skill but then English players generally haven't had the quick feet and agility of the Brazilians. It's natural for coaches to work on the strengths of a youngster, and if that's a deft touch and an eye for a pass they'll work on that rather than trying to get them to skin people all day.

 

I disagree on all points, we will never have the flair of the Brazilians but why can't we have the technique of the Dutch, a small footballing nation - a fellow European nation? All kids want to do with a ball is run with it, dribble, do tricks and to skin their opponent, yet they aren't being encouraged to do this or rather coaches and junior teams don't see this as part of OUR game, like you said, and concentrate on our strengths. It is a culture thing as we are famous for our spirit, work rate, strength and honesty but for my money, these things don't need to be coached, they are already in us, just like the falir is in Brazilians. We need to remove that mindset and concentrate solely on skill, technique and flair.

 

i was in nederland a couple of years ago playing vm in school soccer... during these days we were often out just watching how the training grounds where, and a lot of the training.

during these ours we could see alot of technical development, but most of this was during play and just general fun! i can see now that some of the norwegian teams have adopted some of these traits and i dont see how it should be so hard do the same in england (altough i havent been to england and dont know how it is there) we also played the rotterdam (cant remember team name) youth team (wich we lost 2-1). and these youngster were far more technical then us.. but i recon that england will always have someone over there just looking at different training technices and adopt them... the problem is just to get it down to the general parenter or coach!

[Fenham Mag]

Scored 2 cracking goals for Milan already. He's still go it and should be starting for England.

[Guest Heneage]

I would argue that England has the poorest youth coaching of the big Footballing countries in Europe.

[Ronaldo]

Scored 2 cracking goals for Milan already. He's still go it and should be starting for England.

 

rubbish, he's miles behind Joe Cole and Ashley Young for starters. Walcott and SWP are also more effective

[Guest Stephen927]

Still had it in him when he left Madrid to play for a top club, he's wasting his talents at LA Galaxy.

[alpal78]

Scored 2 cracking goals for Milan already. He's still go it and should be starting for England.

 

rubbish, he's miles behind Joe Cole and Ashley Young for starters. Walcott and SWP are also more effective

 

Blinkered by hatred, Joe Cole has never played consistently well for England. Walcott aside from his hattrick has done jack shit. SWP has very very rarely (almost never) performed for England. Ashley Young is the only one out of the four that has all the attributes to be successful for England and even he is not fully tested at the highest level.

[AyeDubbleYoo]

I've always been a massive fan of Beckham, just a shame he decided to go to America when he did... could still cut it in a decent league... he should have postponed that until the very end of his career.

[Ronaldo]

Scored 2 cracking goals for Milan already. He's still go it and should be starting for England.

 

rubbish, he's miles behind Joe Cole and Ashley Young for starters. Walcott and SWP are also more effective

 

Blinkered by hatred, Joe Cole has never played consistently well for England. Walcott aside from his hattrick has done jack s***. SWP has very very rarely (almost never) performed for England. Ashley Young is the only one out of the four that has all the attributes to be successful for England and even he is not fully tested at the highest level.

 

the premiership is the highest level

[Dinho lad]

injured.

[Mr. Snrub]

Joe Cole miles ahead of Beckham.. ;D

 

Good one.

[Ronaldo]

Joe Cole miles ahead of Beckham.. ;D

 

Good one.

 

rather have Joe Cole than Beckham in my team anyday, legs well and truly gone

[LoveItIfWeBeatU]

If Beckham really wants to move from LA Galaxy to AC Milan why doesn't he just pay the difference between LA Galaxy's valuation of him and what AC Milan have offered them himself? What's £10m to £12m to Beckham?

[Mistle17]

I dont like it when people critisize 'Old fashioned' English football. They say its full of 'cloggers' and players with 'no skills or technique'. Rubbish. OK, I agree, we've been known for playing the long ball and having a physical approach to the game, but what about players we've had in the past like Gazza, Waddle, Keegan, Beardsley, Bobby Charlton and John Barnes! All fantastic players who could beat players and had great skill, some of whom went abroad because they had the technique to cope.

And then you've had the more recent English players like Scholes, Beckham, Lampard, J.Cole, Ashley Young, Wayne Rooney and Micheal Carrick who all have fantastic skill and technique and are a combination of exciting wide players or a core team player from the middle of the park who can dictate games.

 

Admittedly these sort of players are drying up and too many players that come through our youth systems are nothing better than average.

 

The national teams fortunes have, as people have stated, down to a combination of poor managers, lack of discipline, penalties and sheer bad luck. Whenever we've been in World Cups (for the last 5 WC's at least) or Euro's, we've always had teams capable of AT LEAST reaching the Quater-Finals. At least.

With the players we had available to qualify for the 2008 Euros, how we didnt qualify is just disgraceful. Sickening infact.

 

Grassroots football in England is only starting to have a bit of attention cast upon it. We've had good, old-school football people like Sir Trevor Brooking banging on the FA's door to improve youth facilities around clubs and local communities but the FA we're too busy snuggling with the 'Top 4' clubs to bother about it. It had to take failure of qualifying for a major European competion for the FA to really wake up and try and address the situation.

 

You can say all you like about coach's in grassroots level, and part of it is down to them and their methods, but ultimately the problem we've had with producing good English players recently has been down to the FA's way of running our game.